I read a summary for an article in the NYT.
The articles title is "One Woman Conceived a Baby. One Carried Him. Who’s the Mother?"
The summary reads... "A surrogate refused to have an abortion after the fetus was diagnosed with a serious heart problem. She fled to Texas and had the child. Now she wants a judge to give custody to her instead of the biological parents."
[the above was directly quoted from [email protected] and is the property of the New York Times]
In this situation, to me, the bio-parents insistence on an abortion is equivalent to them requesting a discontinuation of the carriage of the fetus. Ergo, the new word - discarriage (the purposeful cessation of a pregnancy - aka an abortion). This is a contrast to a miscarriage (an accidental cessation of a pregnancy).
Why the new word?; to highlight by contrast & commonality the underling difference in meaning. One is purposeful and the other is accidental. In most jurisprudence, the distinction is crucial to judgement.
Why am I blogging about it here? To illustrate to other authors and readers that word choice is crucial to 'fleshing out' the reasoning & meaning of a written (or spoken) passage. If you feel the need, coin a word! {just make sure you explain your rational for the coinage somewhere}
re: the above real-life scenario -
I think adoption law covers it adequately. The bio-parents relinquished responsibility for (abandoned) their unborn child by requesting discarriage of the fetus (the unborn child). The surrogate mother makes her case for adoption by carrying the child to birth. All that's left in the adoption process is the test of suitability of parenthood - which I think should be waved (as it is for all other birth-mothers).
The issues of contractual obligations in the surrogacy is a whole different can of worms!
~That's all for now, folks~
~Ciao